Relationship Between Human and Nature In The Bear By William Faulkner

 In The Bear, William Faulkner’s use of language reveals the underlying meaning and moral lesson of the story. Through the symbolic relationship between the Wilderness, the bear, Boon, and Lion, Faulkner illustrates the destructive consequences of imposing man’s wants upon nature.

The plot of the story is based on the hunt and eventual killing of an enormous and legendary bear named Old Ben, who despite being hunted for many years, has continually defied death. Driven by the legendary tales and myths about Old Ben, Isaac McCaslin, a young hunter and woodsman, along with his hunting party, endlessly wish to find and kill Old Ben during their annual hunting excursions. Isaac, however, is unable to see Old Ben until he has left his rifle, watch, and compass behind. All of which are images of man-made instruments that impose an unnatural order upon nature, which may only be truly experienced by a person who is in a pure and natural state. Moreover, this scene reveals to the reader the symbolic importance of Old Ben as a representation of the wilderness. To further this connection, Faulkner uses descriptive language to illustrate Old Ben’s death by saying he “crashed down” like a “tree falls.” In other words, the death of Old Ben can be broadly viewed as the death of the wilderness—the cutting down of the trees. Following Old Ben’s death, lumber companies buy much of the surrounding land and begin to harvest the trees.

Another important and symbolic relationship is the one between Boon, a rough and simpleminded man, and Lion, the monstrous dog used to hunt Old Ben. The connection between Boon and Lion is made apparent through Faulkner’s almost identical descriptions of them. He describes Lion as having “that strange color like a blued gun-barrel,”  and Boon as having a “blue stubble on his face like the filings from a new gun-barrel”. Faulkner uses both Boon and Lion to represent something natural which has been corrupted by man and used to destroy the wilderness. Lion, when first found, is wild and driven by the force of nature, but is then tamed by man and used as a means to destroy nature—kill Old Ben. During the killing of old ben, however, Lion is injured greatly and dies; showing how man’s corrupting of nature will lead to its death. Similarly, Boon is destroyed in that he is driven mad and never again the same after the death of Old Ben and the consequent moving in of the lumber companies, which is in essence man harvesting nature for his own end.

Faulkner’s The Bear is a cautionary tale rich with significant moral lessons. By using descriptive detail, he makes symbolic connections between characters in the story to warn the reader the devastating consequences to both man and nature when one wishes to selfishly consume and have power over the wilderness.